Archive for November 9th, 2013

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iPad Air Explodes in Australian Vodafone Shop

iPad Air ExplodesNot a good headline for Apple. In a Vodafone store in the city of Canberra, Australia, one of Apple’s new flagship iPad Air’s explodes during shopping hours leading to a full scale evacuation of the store and requiring the fire brigade to be be called to extinguish the fire.

According to several reports the store filled with smoke and sparks flew as the iPad literally exploded while on charge.

No official word from Apple as yet but it is believed that a faulty charging circuit was the culprit as the lithium polymer batteries used in the iPad, and common in a variety of other electronic products, are predisposed to exploded when over charged.

Worrying perhaps but considering the 100’s of thousand iPad devices sold each year having just one recorded explosion isn’t a huge cause for concern just yet as this is the first such recorded incident.

Posted in: News, Tablets
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Nexus 5 WiFi bug

Nexus 5 wifi bugI’ve had my Google Nexus 5 for just over a week and one of the questions I’ve been frequently asked via twitter and Google+ 1 was whether or not I had experienced any issued with the WiFi in the Nexus 5.

Up until yesterday the answer I gave was no. Despite using a large number of WiFi networks almost daily, from the few WiFi access points I have at home to the WiFi on the train I commute on to the WiFi at work and in coffee shops in London, none had given me any WiFi issues with my Nexus 5.

That’s until yesterday. Suddenly my Nexus 5 dropped off one if my home WiFi points, it connected to the other but then despite showing as connected would not transfer any data. Initially I thought this was a problem with my internet connection but soon realised that my Mac and iPhone were still working fine over the same WiFi.

I switched to a different access point but the problem persisted. I rebooted the phone… the problem remained. I’ve tried removing the WiFi networks and re-adding them but that also had no effect.

WiFi access points I have tried using are a D-Link DSL-3680, TP-Link, Airport Extreme, Airport Express and a Vodafone Mifi. All have the same issue: The WiFi shows as connected but there’s no internet connectivity. Furthermore, the WiFi disconnects and reconnects frequently.

Reading other posts on the internet it would see that many other Nexus 5 owners also have the same issues and this seems to be related to an existing Nexus 7 problem too.

Possible Nexus 5 WiFi bug solution

After literally hours of playing around with settings on the Nexus 5, a hard reset, and pulling out old WiFi access points to try I have managed to get my Nexus 5 working again and this is the solution that works for me…

Connect to the WiFi network and then go and ‘Modify Network’. Under the IP Settings I’ve switched to static and have specified an IP address and DNS server addresses. In both instances I’m using the same addresses that were being assigned through DHCP anyway.

Having done that my WiFi comes back to life. The only drawback so far is that I’ve had to do this with each WiFi network that I use. Switching back to DHCP breaks the connection again.

Give it a try and let me know if it solves your problem!

Posted in: Editorial, News, Phones
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By November 9, 2013 Read More →

Panasonic PRX-120 unboxing

Panasonic PRX-120Android has long been used on smartphones and tablets but what about home, fixed-line phones? Here we have the Panasonic PRX-120, a home phone system where the handset is running Android 4.1.

It’s perhaps a little surprising that there aren’t more phone systems that run on Android. With the PRX-120 we have a base unit that plugs in to your phone line and a Android handset that looks like a standard smartphone from about 2 years ago.

One of the benefits of this phone, other than being able to run standard android apps, is that you can receive your fixed-line phone calls as well as being able to use Skype over WiFi from the same phone.

In almost every other way the PRX120 is just like a regular smartphone and while it may not have cutting edge specs relative to an equivalent smartphone, it can perform most functions, although I’m not sure how useful the GPS will be unless you have a REALLY big house!

Here’s a quick unboxing of the Panasonic PRX-120 so that you can see what it’s all about.

https://www.ukmeds.co.uk/surgical-face-masks